Replying to those asking “did EA not know this was an issue after 2-3 weeks”
EA Help / Chat wasn’t aware because after escalating they determined this is not a bug in the game, it’s a feature, purposely designed into an update.
The EA Help Chat where you’d think go to report such issues isn’t responsible for Feature requests or changes to code sent to the developers. It’s a place where if your game behaves not as intended you can get help.
In order to have this issue resolved, ie a code update, EA Help Chat recommended contacting Community Managers and Developers via these forums or any medium.
I share everyone’s pain having purchased iterations of this title for the last 25+ years. However I’m in no way shocked by the lack of support from EA. FIFA22/23 was equally unplayable for those who love Career mode. It wouldn’t save rosters/progress when advancing years, made random formation changes. The issue was never solved because they just waited until the following years releases.
I’ll give it another few weeks and request a refund to wait through another year’s development cycle. Meanwhile eFootball / former EVO is free and getting really good.